Prep baseball: Marin Catholic falls to College Park in section finals

CONCORD &GT;&GT; Marin Catholic High baseball coach Jesse Foppert hung the North Coast Section pennant over a railing in the dugout after the postage awards ceremony Saturday. It's a pennant the Wildcats can hang with a certain amount of pride, but the words "Second Place" hurt too much for Foppert and his players.

Marin Catholic (23-6), seeded fifth in the NCS Division II playoffs lost 7-2 to second-seeded College Park (27-3) in Saturday's final. The Falcons showed their power with two home runs, one of which came in a five-run burst in the first inning.

"It's tough to come back from something like that," Foppert said.

The Wildcats, the MCAL champions, battled a tough road through NCS just to reach the final, with wins over Alameda, Maria Carrillo and Washington along the way. Still, second place "was not our goal," Foppert said.

"The guys had a great season. They played well, but they're not happy right now," Foppert continued.

Wildcats starter Bryan Jakiemiec was touched for seven runs on nine hits, with one walk and three strikeouts, in five innings. It seemed like he wouldn't make it out of the first inning, however, after Nick Oar ripped a three-run homer 340 feet over the left-field wall to give the Falcons a 5-0 lead.

A bases-loaded wild pitch that scored one run and five hits, including an RBI single, had already made things difficult for Jakiemiec and Tam before Oar added his blast.

As the wind died down, the Falcons' Joe DeMers added a two-run homer in almost the same place as Oars' in the bottom of the fifth inning to give College Park a 7-1 lead.

The Falcons, and especially DeMers, seemed right at home, and why shouldn't they? With College Park's campus right across the street from the DVC baseball diamond, the Falcons had the shortest road trip in history. In fact, several Marin Catholic fans got confused before the game and parked at College Park, thinking it was DVC.

DeMers struck out eight batters and walked two, along with six hits in a complete game. He was in complete control from the start, striking out two of the three batters he faced in the first inning. Still, Paul Kunst managed to rally the Wildcats with a two-out double in the top of the third inning and later scored on a single by Andrew Celis.

Marin Catholic mounted one last rally in the top of the seventh inning when Jakiemiec scored on a groundout. DeMers struck out the next batter and a line out to short ended the rally and the game.

Celis was 2-for-3 for the Wildcats. John MacLean added a double and singles by Kunst, Jakiemiec, and Richie Epidendio accounted for all six Marin Catholic hits.